The Seaport Music Festival is proud to announce its 15th anniversary celebration in partnership with The Village Voice and South Street Seaport Museum! The Seaport Music Festival has been gathering New Yorkers and tourists alike with authentic programming in a unique setting for the past 15 years. The festival will continue that legacy with an eye on the future, while also celebrating the rich history of this awe-inspiring venue in Lower Manhattan. With the 50th anniversary of the museum together with the 15th anniversary of the festival, it is an amazing time and opportunity to tell this story. For more information, please visit: http://www.
Reflecting on the festival's history, founder Stephen Dima explains, "The Seaport Music Festival is a NY institution. It was a scruffy little festival that could, and that on many occasions, DID. It became a place where you could see bands that nobody else was going to take a chance on in a unique and relatively undiscovered part of Lower Manhattan."
In addition to live music, Seaport Music Festival will feature film screenings, comedy and dance. This year's lineup includes performances by:
Ted Leo and the Pharmacists, who's self releasing his first album since 2010 called The Hanged Man, and who incidentally has a long, infamous history with the Seaport Music Festival, having performed at the inaugural fest in 2002 plus 5 other subsequent years. At this year's festival, Ted curated a special lineup which includes: comedic, musical and visual artist Jean Grae, heavy-beat minded electronic duo Azar Swan and NYC DIY rock'n'rollers Big Huge. Hosted by Dap
New York Night Train DJ Jonathan Toubin has also been invited to curate a line-up, which features The Make-Up, a seminal post-punk band from DC led by Ian Svenonius who announced highly anticipated reunion shows this year. The line-up also includes Martin Rev (The surviving half of one of the most important bands of all time, Suicide), James Chance & The Contortions, The Wolfmanhattan Project, Death Valley Girls, Surfbort and Warm Drag. The acts here are not bonded together through genre but through social relationships and the kind of subterranean aesthetic that built the downtown music culture that changed the world, and became globally ubiquitous, but is rapidly disappearing without a trace from its Manhattan incubator. Seaport Music Festival and New York Night Train combine in their shared mission to keep downtown's underground music heritage alive and in its hometown.
The Dance Cartel: Premiere of Wet Clutch, an immersive drive-in dance experience that reinterprets and remixes movie heroines from the last four decades of American film, made possible in part with public funds from Creative Engagement/Creative Learning, supported by the New York City Department of Cultural Affairs in partnership with the City Council and administered by Lower Manhattan Cultural Council.
"The Village Voice has covered and been a part of some of the most iconic cultural moments in New York City's history," said Kerrie Gillis, Chief Revenue Officer of The Village Voice. "Our partnership with theSeaport Music Festival continues that tradition, granting thousands of Voice readers and music fans access to the best the city has to offer at one of NYC's most historic venues."
Captain Jonathan Boulware, Executive Director of the South Street Seaport Museum, cited the long connection between the Museum and music over its fifty year history. "In the earliest years of the Seaport Museum, artists like Pete Seeger and others sang on the pier for lunchtime crowds. For years Pier 16 on the East River has been a place to hear music and to connect through that music to the origins of New York itself."
Celebrating its 50th anniversary, South Street Seaport Museum is a cultural institution dedicated to telling the story of the rise of New York as a port city and its critical role in the development of the United States. The Museum uses its historic buildings and ships to provide interactive exhibits, education, and experiences.
The festival will also feature locally sourced foods from the Fulton Stall Market and oysters from Empire Oyster.
One Manhattan Square, a modern glass vertical village at 220 South Street, under development by Extell Development Company, will join as a sponsor of the anniversary celebration.
Attracting thousands of attendees each year, Seaport Music Festival has previously showcased performers such as Animal Collective, Suicide, Angelique Kidjo, Hot Chip and many more. For more information, please visit: http://www.
